The Downy Woodpecker 267 



ant as 'the little black milkmaid, who pastures her green cows 

 in the meadow of a rose leaf.' This is a graphic, if not some- 

 what fanciful, picture of the relations of ants and plant lice; 

 but unfortunately the black milkmaid does not limit her pas- 

 tures to the rose-leaf meadows. There are comparatively few 

 plants which do not suffer to some extent by the ravages of 

 plant lice, and fruit trees and ornamental shrubs seem to be 

 more subject to their attacks. Ants protect these lice from 

 harm, and when the plant on which they are feeding is ex- 

 hausted, carry them to fresh pastures, and in some cases ac- 

 tually build shelters over them. Besides destroying the ants 

 the downy woodpecker eats many of the lice. * * * Of 

 the food of the downy woodpecker 13 per cent, consists of 

 wood-boring coleopterous larvae, insects that do an immense 

 amount of damage to fruit and forest trees, and are, as stated, 

 protected from the attack of ordinary birds by their habit of 

 burrowing in trees. Besides the grubs taken from within the 

 wood, the woodpecker eats many of the parent insects from 

 whose eggs these grubs are hatched. It also destroys numer- 

 ous other species that live upon the foliage and bark. Cater- 

 pillars, both those that bore into the tree and those that live 

 upon the leaves, constitute 16 per cent, of its food, and bugs 

 that live on berries and give to them such a disagreeable taste 

 form a considerable portion of its diet. Bark lice or scale in- 

 sects, pests of the worst description, are also eaten by this 

 bird, and to an extent that is surprising when their minute 

 size is considered." Is not this a good record for the 

 "Downy"? 



The reader by examining the illustration will note that im- 

 mediately under the bill of "Downy" and to the right of it are 

 two small round holes in the bark of the tree to which he 

 clings. These are suggestive. "Downy" is sometimes called 

 the Little Guinea Woodpecker and the Little Sapsucker. As 

 the last name indicates he is accused of being a sapsucker, 

 whether rightfully so or not, I am not prepared to say. From 

 what Prof. Beal says of his food, I am inclined to the belief 

 that the holes are made to catch larvae and ants, which we 

 know frequently are found under and in the crevices of the 

 bark of trees. As I have walked to and from my office I have 



